Towards welfare biology: Evolutionary economics of animal consciousness and suffering
@article{Ng1995TowardsWB, title={Towards welfare biology: Evolutionary economics of animal consciousness and suffering}, author={Yew-Kwang Ng}, journal={Biology and Philosophy}, year={1995}, volume={10}, pages={255-285} }
Welfare biology is the study of living things and their environment with respect to their welfare (defined as net happiness, or enjoyment minus suffering). Despite difficulties of ascertaining and measuring welfare and relevancy to normative issues, welfare biology is a positive science. Evolutionary economics and population dynamics are used to help answer basic questions in welfare biology: Which species are affective sentients capable of welfare? Do they enjoy positive or negative welfare…
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